Hey Larry,

...it's a mistake to consider that hybrid a sailboat, it's nothing but a trawler with a mast... One really has to admire Alvah Simon's diplomatic take on it, in his review of the SP Cruiser in CRUISING WORLD:

The SP wasn't designed to sail to windward, and it didn't perform well on this point of sail, as the 714 square feet of sail area couldn't compensate for the substantial weight and windage. The sail plan, however, does add stability, distance, and redundancy to the boat's motoring range.

LMAO!

IP also sells the boat without a mast, calling it a PY Cruiser, and making it enough of a powerboat to get featured in POWER & MOTORYACHT magazine...

http://www.powerandmotoryacht.com/boat-tests/island-packet-py-41

The final paragraph of the review indicates that IP does, indeed, have their finger on the pulse of the future of Kroozing... (grin)

The PY Cruiser is not the only highly efficient vessel Island Packet's recently put on the market. There's also the SP (Sail Power) Cruiser, a sloop-rigged vessel that's virtually the same as the PY in terms of layout, design, and horsepower as well as speed and fuel burn under power. But the SP also sails almost effortlessly. Say you're chugging along and decide to nix the Yanmar and switch to wind power. Simply round up into the breeze, leave the helm for the cockpit momentarily, load the lines into the Lewmar electric winch, and then return to the helm to tweak arrangements with push buttons as you proceed. Could there be anything as easy—and as fuel efficient—as fully electric sail controls? Well, yeah. According to Island Packet, the company will introduce a version of the SP Cruiser within a year or so that will virtually sail herself. Thanks to constant digital input from a wind indicator at the top of the mast as well as some serious computer firepower, the boat will electrically operate her own winches, trim her own sheets, perhaps even decide when to tack based on course information arriving via GPS. All you'll have to do is steer!

So, the computer will decide when to tack, huh? More like "when to fire up the engine", would be my guess... (grin)

Looking at that video, however, I think even rolling out a mere scrap of sail in those conditions could have been pretty risky, jogging under power slowly into the seas would have been likely been the best approach... Did you see how deeply that boat was heeling, due to the immense amount of windage afforded by the high freeboard, superstructure, and rig alone? Given the thing has a ballast/displacement ratio of a mere 24 PERCENT, I'm surprised it didn't just lay on it's side, and stay there...

You're right to note the liability of that forward cockpit, it could have easily captured a significant amount of water, that might have only "spilled out" at a very deep angle of heel...

best regards,

Jon